T. R. Smith, comp. Poetica Erotica: Rare and Curious Amatory Verse. 1921–22.
Ephelia’s Lamentation
By Sir George Etherege (1635?–1691)(Roxburgh Ballads, vol. iv.) HOW far are they deceived, who hope in vain | |
| A lasting lease of joys from love t’obtain! | |
| All the dear sweets we promise or expect, | |
| After enjoyment turn to cold neglect. | |
| Could love a constant happiness have known, | 5 |
| The mighty wonder had in me been shown; | |
| Our passions are so favoured by fate, | |
| As if she meant them an eternal date. | |
| So kind you look’d, such tender words you spoke, | |
| ’Twas past belief such vows should e’er be broke. | 10 |
| Fix’d on my eyes, how often did you say | |
| You could with pleasure gaze an age away? | |
| When thoughts too great for words had made you mute, | |
| In kisses you would tell my hand your suit. | |
| So great your passions were, so far above | 15 |
| The common gallantries that pass for love, | |
| At worst, I thought, if you unkind should prove, | |
| Your ebbing passion would be kinder far | |
| Than the first transports of all others are. | |
| Nor was my love or fondness less than yours, | 20 |
| In you I centred all my hopes of cures; | |
| For you my duty to my friends forgot, | |
| For you I lost—alas! what lost I not? | |
| Fame, all the valuable things of life, | |
| To meet your love by a less name than wife; | 25 |
| How happy was I then, how dearly blest, | |
| When you lay panting on my tender breast, | |
| Acting such things as ne’er can be express’d! | |
| Thousand fresh looks you gave me every hour, | |
| Whilst greedily I did those looks devour; | 30 |
| Till quite o’ercome with charms I trembling lay, | |
| At every look you gave, melted away. | |
| I was so highly happy in your love, | |
| Methought I pitied them that dwelt above. | |
| Think then, thou greatest, loveliest, falsest man! | 35 |
| How you have vow’d, how I have loved, and then, | |
| My faithless dear! be cruel if you can. | |
| How I have loved I cannot, need not tell; | |
| For every act has shown I loved too well. | |
| Since first I saw you I ne’er had a thought | 40 |
| Was not entirely yours; to you I brought | |
| My virgin innocence and freely made | |
| My love and offering to your noble bed. | |
| Since when you’ve been the star by which I steer’d, | |
| And nothing else but you I loved or fear’d. | 45 |
| Your smiles I only live by; and I must, | |
| Whene’er you frown, be shatter’d into dust. | |
| Oh! can the coldness which you show me now, | |
| Suit with the generous heat you once did show? | |
| I cannot live on pity or respect: | 50 |
| A thought so mean would my whole love infect; | |
| Less than your love I scorn, sir, to expect. | |
| Let me not live in dull indifferency, | |
| But give me rage enough to make me die: | |
| For if from you I needs must meet my fate, | 55 |
| Before your pity I would choose your hate. | |